158 
A. Alcock —Carcinological Fauna of India. 
[No. 2, 
in the Journal of the Linnsean Society (Zoology), Yol. XIV. 1879; 
and by the same author’s Report on the ‘ Challenger ’ Braehyura ; and to 
these important works I have here to acknowledge my great indebted¬ 
ness. 
I have not, however, been able to give my complete adherence to 
the classification proposed by Mr. Miers, further than to accept the 
previously adopted division of the Oxyrhyncha into two groups of 
equal value—the Maioids and the Partlienopoids. To these groups, I 
would, following Dr. Claus, give the rank of families — Maiidse and 
Parthcnopidse. 
But to further sub-divide a group like the Maioids — in which we 
find, as Miers himself remarks, every reasonable gradation of form 
from Stenorhynchus to Pericera —into separate families, as is done by 
Miers, involves, I think, an unnecessary and unphilosophical interference 
with the meaning of the term ‘ family.’ 
Nor is anything gained, from the point of view of the practical 
systernatist, by establishing families which overlap in all direc¬ 
tions. 
I am so much indebted to the works of Mr. Miers, that I should be 
loath to criticize them in any but a friendly spirit. But it seems to me 
that while Mr. Miers has recognized the value of certain characters 
round the developments and modifications of which the Maioid Crabs 
easily cleave into most natural groups, he has proceeded in practice to 
ignore in great measure the value of his own generalization. 
It appears to me that Mr. Miers’ families of Maiinea consist each 
of a quite natural nucleus hidden in a loose artificial wrapping. 
Beginning with the Iuaclndse of Miers, we find a natural group, 
typified by such forms as Leptopodia and Inachus , linked with forms like 
Anamatliia , Xenocarcinus , Huenia , Pugettia , Aeanthonyx , Poclea and 
Stenononops , none of which are any more nearly related to Leptopodia 
and Inachus than they are to any other Maioid. 
In the Maiidse of Miers again, we find a most arbitrary jumble of 
forms. Amid the confusion, however, we can discern a large natural 
nucleus, typified not, it is true, by Maia , but by such forms as Egeria r 
Chioncecet.es , Pisa , Naceia, etc.; but these are no more nearly related to 
Maia, Paramithrax , Scliizophrys , Criocarcinus, and Micippa than they 
are to any other Maioid. 
The third family, Periceridse, is even more bewildering; but as 
Miers himself, in his Report on the 1 Challenger ’ Braehyura , has distri¬ 
buted many of his original Periceroid genera among the other two 
families, it would be unjust to enter into any detailed criticism of this 
family now. 
